Zainab was with her cousin the day she was kidnapped, says father

KASUR: Father of the seven-year old rape-slay victim Zainab Ansari said on Thursday that his daughter left house with her cousin the day she was kidnapped, ARY News reported.

Speaking exclusively to ARY News, Zainab’s father Ameen Ansari revealed that the girl was with her cousin on her way to attend Quran class at her aunt’s home but as her cousin went inside, she stayed outside for some reason.

“But when she did not come inside (her aunt’s house), but when they came outside, Zainab was nowhere,” said Ameen Ansari.

Zainab was seen on a CCTV camera being led away by a man on January 4. In their frantic hunt for the daughter over the next five days, as Zainab’s parents were performing Umrah in Saudi Arabia, the family shared the CCTV footage on social media widely but couldn’t get the girl back as her body was found from a garbage heap near their home.

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About fear raised by several quarters that Zainab’s kidnapper was someone she knew, Ameen Ansari said that he doesn’t know the man seen in the CCTV footage.

“The way she is going with the man (kidnapper), I can say and it’s my own assumption that the kidnapper knew that we are away for about two weeks now so he may would have told Zainab that he is going to meet us (Zainab’s parents),” said Zainab’s father.

Kidnapped on January 4 and found from a garbage heap on January 9, Zainab’s medical report suggested that she was sexually assaulted before being strangulated to death.

The girl’s rape and murder sparked outrage among the residents of the city and whole of Pakistan with social activists and general public starting a trend #JusticeForZainab on social media.

As Ameen and her wife landed in Pakistan on January 10, they demanded from the Chief Justice of Pakistan and Chief of Army Staff to take action against the culprits of this heinous crime and provide them with justice.

Later, the COAS issued a message for support for Zainab’s parents while Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) took suo motu notice of the incident and ordered the police to present an inquiry report within 24 hours.

‘Police only had tea and oranges’

Relatives and people of the area told ARY News that police neither cooperated with the neighbourhood teams formed to find Zainab nor acted promptly when provided with “proofs” by the girl’s family.

Residents of the area, who claimed to have formed vigilance teams to find Zainab, claimed that police only enjoyed “oranges and tea” in the neighbourhood and didn’t even cooperate with the vigilance teams.